Upon This Winter Night
by Baroness Kika
Summary: Three winters have passed since the Queen of Ice and Snow took Peeta from Katniss; never again will they allow anything to tear them asunder. Based on SponsorMusing's "The Shimmering Glass".


**A/N: The following is, in fact, a fanfiction of one of my favorite fanfictions - _The Shimmering Glass_, by the lovely and wonderful _SponsorMusings_. Before you read any further, you should really pull that story up and read or re-read it, as the case for you might be. It's a transformative story that I have merely tried to emulate in any tiny way possible. Without the beta help of _sohypothetically_ and pre-reading prowess of _MalTease_, this story would be a very sorry excuse for...well, anything.**

**For those who might not know SM, she is one of the kindest, most supportive people you could ever hope to know, and that's in addition to being a truly talented and wonderful writer. She also recently celebrated a birthday, and very graciously at my request, she allowed me to borrow her interpretations of Everlark and the world of Panem she adapted for _The Shimmering Glass_...and here's the result.**

**Happy belated birthday, SM, my sweet friend and confidant. I love you dearly, and hope you enjoy this.**

* * *

A frigid wind blows past his face and the freshly fallen snow crunches under his feet as he makes his way to the boundary fence that separates the District from the woods. He crouches low and scoops up a small handful of the powder and tosses it at the barbed wire strung between the poles, waiting to hear the telltale sizzle of electricity. When nothing comes, he smiles and crouches again, this time finding the gap in the fence that he knows she wiggles through when she makes her trips into the woods.

It's been three winters now, and he doesn't follow her out to the woods often. The Queen of Ice and Snow still plagues his dreams from time to time, although the frissons of terror that used to run up and down his spine at the sight of the woods beyond the District have long since abated. But today demands such a journey for the sake of privacy—they get so little of it in their respective homes. He smiles at the thought that if she agrees to what they'll speak about when he reaches her, privacy shall not be an issue much longer. He brushes the snow off his jacket and trousers, hoists the satchel over his shoulder an inch higher, and sticks his hands deep within his pockets as he presses into the dense thicket of bare trees covered in fluffy white ice crystals.

Even though she is the huntress, he can track her footsteps well enough in the fresh powder, for she's the only one who ever ventures so deeply into the forest. The footprints she's left behind indicate she's stuck to her usual trail. The few snares she has set up along the way are empty. The wind picks up again, chapping his lips and freezing his cheeks.

He is fairly certain that he spies her before she hears him. The long dark braid peeks out from the orange knitted scarf and hat he'd saved his coins to buy her last "Christmas". She'd chided him that orange, even the muted sunset orange of the felted yarn, was the very last color a hunter would wear out in the snow, but he knew she'd worn it every cold day from then on. The burnt, warm color brings out the olive tone of her skin even when it is rosy and windblown and somehow seems to make the grey of her eyes all the more piercing. He slips behind a tree and watches her—her posture is perfectly straight and an arrow is nocked in her bow. He watches her arm arch back, pulling the taut string and the feather fliers with it for only a split second before the arrow sails through the air towards its target. Even from afar, he can hear the series of soft thumps as the arrowhead finds purchase and the felled animal crumples on the snow. It isn't a large one, he can tell, but the look on Katniss's face is triumphant all the same.

He waits until she lowers the bow before calling to her, "Nice shooting, sweetheart."

She glares at him, but her scowl isn't genuine—not when she hears _his_ voice. He trudges out from behind the tree, never-minding his heavy footfalls, and sidles up to her with a brilliant smile.

"You're late, you know," she says chidingly as he stretches his hand out to caress her cheek.

"I had a couple of late deliveries to make. But I brought a surprise that ought to make up for it. Forgive me?"

She shrugs as she leans her face into his palm. "I suppose I can do that."

"I'll get a fire started and shake out the blankets, if you haven't already?" he offers.

"I'll finish getting our lunch," she says, nodding towards the lump of fur in the distance that is her kill.

Before he turns away from her to slip inside the small hut just out of eye-shot near the lake, he steps towards her to close the small distance between them and tilts her face upwards with a nudge of his thumb against her chin. Kissing her isn't anything new, but every time his lips slant over hers and their noses bump together before their faces move automatically to deepen the touch, a surge of joy spreads from his heart to the very tips of his being. He's loved her for _so_ long. It hardly matters how long it took her to catch up—she loves him too. It's the best thing he could ever have hoped for.

He's heading for the hut when she whistles to him, soft and low. The familiar four-note tune makes him smile as he turns around to ask her what she needs.

"I love you, Peeta," she says softly, the billowing wind carrying her words into his ears and making his heart skip a beat.

"I love you, Katniss," he calls back. Silently he adds, _And hopefully you'll finally understand just how much._

* * *

He spreads the thick quilts over the canvas tarp near the small makeshift hearth before he coaxes the small flames into a proper blaze. It'll be several more minutes before the fire warms the tiny hut, but it ought to be cozy enough when Katniss slips inside with her skinned and gutted kill. He places the small cooking pan filled with water near enough to the flames to begin warming it for the mixture of powdered milk, cocoa powder, and cinnamon sugar he's brought for them to drink, and sets out the day-old rolls and pastries along with the little hunk of goat cheese he's gotten from Prim. The fire warms his fingers; his heart races just considering the way her hand—and his—might look, should she agree to his request

"Hot chocolate?" Katniss's voice interrupts his inner-most thoughts and snaps him back to attention. "What's the special occasion?"

"Christmas," he replies, giving her a nonchalant look as if to add '_obviously_'.

She huffs. "You change the day of this 'Christmas' every year, you know. Wasn't it meant to have been the same day every time?"

"Maybe," he says with a shrug, even though he knows full well that she is correct.

"I didn't get you anything," she sighs as she toes off her snow-laden boots and sits next to him on the pile of blankets with her feet tucked under her.

"You've already given me everything I could want," he reminds her. "You love me."

"And you love me… So why do you still give me presents I can't reciprocate?"

Peeta's throat goes dry, and he has to force a cough to be able to speak. "After this year, I won't ever surprise you with it again. Fair?"

She scowls indignantly but leans forward and brushes her lips against his all the same. "Fair."

The tiny cloth envelope in his back pocket feels like it's wearing a hole in his skin as he watches her spread the hare meat over the coals to cook. Her cheeks and the tip of her nose are flushed from the wind, and she's licking her lips over and over to keep them from drying out. To him she has never looked more lovely.

"Katniss, I—" he begins, but loses his nerve when her quicksilver eyes lock onto him. He covers his folly quickly. "I'm g-going to get get some more water."

"Just get some snow and we'll let it melt. The ice on the lake is a little too slushy out in the middle," she says as she tears the corner off one of the croissants and dips it in the cocoa and water mixture in the small pot.

"Sure. Be right back," he says, hoisting himself to his feet and taking the small tin pail they use for such purposes with him.

Once outside the hut, Peeta berates himself. _Just ask her! _the voice inside his head says. _Just ask and you'll stop tearing your hair out with worry over her reply._

_What if she says 'no'?_

_What if she says 'yes'?_

_Oh gracious… What if she begins to laugh?! _

Every scenario plays out in his head as he scoops a patch of pure, white snow into the tin. He murmurs to himself, practicing the words of love and transcendent desire he wants to say to her. He doesn't want to fumble again, so he decides and re-decides how he'll ask, focusing so hard that he almost misses the swooshing crunch of snow under the runners of the magic sleigh that skates to a stop behind him. He does, however, feel the renewed chill in the air that seems to freeze his very lungs and blood inside his body. Peeta knows as soon as he stands and turns to look over the frozen lake that she will be there.

_The Queen of Ice and Snow stole Peeta from Katniss before. Her sulty, sinister kisses had made Peeta forget the love of his life—indeed, his life completely. But they had defeated her, and Peeta had escaped her clutches, all thanks to Katniss's bravery and the passion of her own lips against his._

Peeta knows in an instant what the fur-clad, heavily lipsticked temptress wants now that she's reappeared in their lives, and it isn't him. _Katniss_ had been the one to rescue him from the Queen's clutches. She wants her…his Katniss. His love. The one who outsmarted the Queen at her very own Game.

But she won't have her. Peeta won't allow it. Katniss saved him, and it's a debt no number of Christmas presents and kisses and declarations of his unyielding love can truly repay. But _this_ he can do.

She's left her filleting knife outside the hut in the snow, blood still crusted on the blade from gutting the hare she's roasting on their fire inside. He hopes he might not actually have to use it, but he's prepared to if the Queen won't leave them be. His boots create new prints in the snow as he saunters towards her, the knife firmly grasped in his fist. He sees her lush, pink lips curl upwards into a broader and broader smile the closer he gets to her, and can smell the sensuous musk of her skin and hair. It's meant to ensorcel him, captivate him into following her anywhere and giving himself over to her completely—but Peeta's heart is taken, so all it truly does is anger him. If he's honest, it frightens him a bit as well.

When he's close enough to speak to her and be heard, he growls, "You'll leave. You'll leave right now, and you'll let her alone."

"Or what?" the Queen purrs. "Do you really think you could possibly have any power over me, Mr. Mellark?"

"You'll leave," he repeats. "She'll never belong to you. And I'll never belong to you again."

"Oh, foolish boy in love," the Queen sighs. "I don't want either of you. Not in the way you suppose I might."

"Peeta! Stop!"

He spins in place when he hears Katniss's pleading voice cry out, and locks eyes on her just in time to see her raise her bow. She effortlessly nocks an arrow and sends it flying in his direction, and he wonders if he'll feel it pierce his heart. It whizzes past his ear and he follows it with his eyes, watching it imbed itself deep within the thick pelt the Snow Queen wears and pierce her flesh underneath.

The icy woman's shriek rings out and startles birds out of surrounding trees and into the sky. She crumples to her knees, her long skirts and furs pooling around her as she clutches at the arrow and pulls it free. Crimson blood spreads from the wound and stains the toasted marshmallow colored pelt before it begins to flow freely. Suddenly, the Queen's eyes forge a connection to Peeta's, and he watches as her lips curl upwards again. She raises her hand, pursing her thumb and middle fingers of her pink-gloved hand together before snapping loudly.

Peeta's head tells him it's time to run, and so he whirls around again and pumps his legs underneath him as he races towards Katniss's side. Because of this, he doesn't see the moment that the Queen's blood splatters against the white snow and ice underneath her crumpled form like Katniss does. In fact, he sees almost nothing at all, only hears the deafening crack of the ice giving way beneath him, and the rush of the freezing water as he plunges within its depths.

* * *

He's stopped shivering quite so violently underneath her, and his heartbeat still thrums steadily against her ear—but he hasn't opened his eyes since she laid him down on the canvas tarp near the fire and pressed herself against him under the thick blankets to share body heat. She's not even sure if he realizes their complete state of undress, although it's one of a thousand things that she can't keep off her mind as she stares into the fire. Anything to keep from glancing down at him again like she had ever-so-briefly when she'd pulled off his sopping wet trousers and shorts. She hadn't expected him to look like…well. She hadn't known what to expect.

For over a year, everything between them had been completely chaste. Although she felt like she had every curve and contour of his mouth memorized and could recall in an instant the feel of the almost invisible blonde stubble against her palms, they shared little else other than heated kisses until one not-so-special spring evening. He had hopped across the gap between their windows so they could watch the sunset wrapped in one another's arms. When the brilliant orb had sunk completely behind the dark hills in the distance, Peeta had turned her in his embrace and pressed his lips to hers—this was nothing extraordinary. In fact, they did this very thing almost every day. But as soon as his tongue had slipped into her mouth and began to massage hers, something else overtook the pair of lovers, and their delicate kisses turned feverish. He'd hoisted her up onto the sill of her window and insinuated himself between her thighs while her arms locked around his neck. They breathed in only the other as their mouths collided again and again, until suddenly, Katniss had felt…something else.

He'd pulled away, red-faced and stammering, and ducked back into his own bedroom so quickly it had made her head spin. It had been hours later that she'd finally recalled the awkward conversation she and her mother had when she was fourteen that she finally realized what had happened to him. For a fraction of a second, she'd been completely mortified—and then a rush of heat blossomed in her heart and spread to her pelvis. It had been nearly impossible to sleep thinking about it and considering just how oddly powerful it made her feel.

It took months before either became brave enough to touch the other anywhere but the places their hands usually came to rest—necks, hips, forearms, the small of their backs—but after the first time the palm of Peeta's hand curved over the swell of her left breast, they slowly became bolder and bolder. No matter how adventurous their roaming fingers became, not once has Katniss actually seen more than just Peeta's bare chest, let alone allowed him to see anything but perhaps her bare shoulders or her legs up to the mid-thigh.

In her mind, she knows this is simply how it is done to keep someone from succumbing to hypothermia: the freezing water plastered their clothes to their skin as soon as she'd pulled him from the dark, slushy waves, and she had to half-carry him into the hut. She wasn't thinking of anything other than becoming warm once more when she ridded them of their clothes and sprawled out over him, not until she'd caught sight of the equipment between his legs. Now it duels for dominance in her brain against a single, concrete thought: _I could have lost him again. To her, but forever. I can't lose him. Not again._

The reality is so much worse than her own nightmares.

The flames are rising in such a way that tells her there needs to be another log added onto the fire, and both the cocoa and roasted rabbit are a lost cause. And yet, even mostly certain that his body temperature has normalized, she can't wrench herself away from him. The beat of his heart under her ear and the rise and fall of his chest is too comforting. Her hand seeks out his to knot their fingers together; surely his are still slightly numb for how cold they remain.

"Peeta?" she squeaks, breaking her gaze at the fire to look up to his placid, unconscious face. "Peeta, wake up."

He doesn't stir, but she can feel his breath against her forehead. She sits up on her knees to crawl further up his torso before arching her neck to nudge his lips with hers. The light kiss doesn't coax him awake the way she hopes it might, so she tries again. And again. And again.

* * *

_Peeta, please. Please wake up._

_Peeta, don't let her take you from me._

_Peeta, you have to stay with me. Please, Peeta, please stay with me._

He is forced back to consciousness at the sound of her words and the caresses of her lips against his eyes, his cheeks, his jaw. He still feels cold from head to toe, but the warmth of her skin against his is spreading like a slow burning fire towards his very fingertips and toes. She saved him, he knows that, but everything after her arrow pierced the Queen's body is a blur. How did they get back inside the hut…and more importantly, _why are they naked_?

"Katniss?" he croaks as her mouth peppers the outer shell of his ears with quick, gasping kisses.

"Peeta…" As her mercury colored eyes lock upon his, he makes out the pink rims and prominent red veins that only make the silver color of her irises all the more vivid.

"What happened?" His tongue feels heavy within his mouth, and it's everything he can do to not cocoon in on himself for more warmth. But it would be impossible with her straddling him as she is, and the mere notion of that is too luscious to pull away from.

"She's gone. She disappeared after the ice gave way, just like magic. She's gone…I won't let her hurt you again," Katniss whispers, curling her fingers into his damp hair.

"I was trying to keep her from you," he says. "To pay you back for saving me."

"No…no, Peeta, there's nothing you have to pay me back for. Not ever."

"You saved me. And you saved me again. How can I—"

Her lips crush against his to silence him, and he drinks her in. For so many years, too many years maybe, he'd longed to know what her lips might feel like. Would they be dry or lush? Would she make any noise at all if he took the bottom one between his teeth and nibbled? What would her tongue feel like against his own? He knows all the answers to these questions now, but he's still certain that the exact effect she has on him is still unclear to her.

Or it was, anyway, until her leg slips between his and her thigh grazes his member sinuously. The warmth in his chest spreads to his core and he can feel himself stiffening, his length pressing firmly against her leg. He knows this isn't new to her, but their nakedness and proximity as it happens makes him flush from head to toe. She shifts on top of him, caressing him much more deliberately, and moans into his mouth. A groan of his own bubbles up from his chest; try as he might to suppress his longing, save it for a time they aren't overwhelmed with lingering fear and residual cold, he just can't.

And besides...if not now, on the day he meant to ask her to be his forever, then when?

Still, he catches her hand in his as it trails down his side and wrenches their mouths apart. "Katniss, are you…"

"You can't ever scare me like that again," she whispers. "I can't lose you again."

"You won't. I promise."

He nudges his nose against hers before gently sucking her bottom lip in between his own. Her hands continue to explore the planes of bare skin at his sides, even as he slowly eases himself out from underneath her to press her onto her back. He hovers above her, bracing himself on his forearm as he takes his turn peppering her face with kisses, sampling the delicate skin under her ears and jaw, listening to the gurgles and gasps in her throat when he trails his tongue along the expanse of skin on her neck. In the past, he's been daring enough to slip his fingers under her shirt to feel the heated skin of her lower back or abdomen, or perhaps cup her breast or the curve of her bottom with only the thin layer of her undergarments separating his skin from hers. Now nothing separates them, and when he grazes the pebbled peak of one of her breasts with the tips of his fingers, her yelp of excitement makes him twitch with anticipation.

Their mouths slant over one another's again, and their knuckles and palms begin exploring all the more fervently. Her fingernails are stubby but surprisingly sharp as she grazes the groves along either side of his spine. He can't help but tweak the skin above her hipbone with his thumb and forefinger before trailing his knuckles along the side of her thigh to the crook of her knee. She bends it with just the slightest nudge of his hand, which he then moves up and underneath to touch her.

She moans into his mouth when his fingers slide in between her soft folds for the very first time. His fingers trace up and down, sweeping through a patch of soft hair at the apex before toying with the bumpy peaks and moist shallows that make up her sex. Peeta sighs into the curve of her neck in reverence as he feels her hips buck gently against his hand, and he places a tender kiss under her earlobe before whispering to her, "Help me?"

Her hand slides down her belly and covers his. With entwined, shaky fingers, she guides his ministrations until she's mewling and writhing—he learns quickly, or so he gleans from the way her hand falls to the side and allows his to work the little kernel that seems to pulse and swell the more his fingers tease it.

"Kiss me," she gasps, and he obliges, covering her mouth with his own a second before her entire body seems to clench and then go boneless as she cries into his mouth. He pulls away and looks down at her: her cheeks are flushed and her breath comes in rapid pants, but her lips are pulled upwards in a sated, if slightly exhausted smile.

He begins to explain to her that he doesn't need anything more than to see that look of undeniable pleasure on her face, that that alone is enough for him when her own hand slips between his legs and her fingers circle his engorged flesh.

"You just need to go slowly," she whispers, tangling the fingers of her other hand in his hair as she picks her leg up and drapes it over his hips in invitation. He rolls so he's balanced on both arms, his waist dropping between her spread thighs.

"You're sure?" he asks tentatively, even though every nerve of his body is firing with the need for more.

She nods and shifts her hips under his. Her hand reaches between them to help guide him as he presses forward slowly, oh so slowly; he gasps and she hisses as he feels her stretch around him to accommodate his length, and he freezes until the look on her face ceases to be contorted in pain.

"I'm sorry," he whispers. He wants and does not want to pull away, but her legs lock at the ankles behind him and she shakes her head and kisses the tip of his nose. Her hips buck against him like they had against his hand, and every synapse in his brain fires at once at the feeling of her clenching and moving around him. With a few more whispers and light kisses, he's convinced to rock against her, and their sighs and whimpers mingle together with the steady hum of icy wind outside their safe little haven.

They give to one another what the Queen of Ice and Snow had yearned to steal from Peeta—their innocence, their love, their everything—with wanton moans of one another's names and the gentle slapping of skin against skin. It's all over too quickly, as first times so often are. Katniss holds him in place as he grunts out in relief and tenses above her just before he collapses against her chest. He feels himself soften and slip from her warmth, and he trembles as he recovers his breath in the afterglow. Their fingers intertwine and their lips bump together softly. It takes him a moment in the dimmed light from the dwindling fire to see the smile illuminating her face.

He thinks to the cloth envelope in the pocket of his trousers, hoping against hope that it hadn't slipped out in the frigid water to be lost forever, nor that she'd discovered it when she undressed him. He briefly considers disengaging from her to search for it, but the warmth of her skin, slightly damp with perspiration, and the way her arms cradle him as though she's afraid to let him go keep him in place.

_I'll just have to ask her later_, he supposes, and presses his lips against hers firmly before murmuring to her once again how deeply and desperately he loves her.

Only when their lips are swollen from so many kisses and he rolls onto his side to allow her to replenish her lungs with air do her eyes flit from his. Her thumb trails the side of his tranquil face, and she rolls so her back is facing him and grabs a long, poker-like stick to stoke the embers of their fire. There's little to catch onto without more kindling, which is only accessible to whichever of them braves the cold air outside their little cocoon of blankets. The look on Katniss's face when she rolls over again certainly does not indicate she is cold in the slightest.

"Peeta…I was thinking about those rolls you brought. How do you suppose they might taste toasted?"


End file.
